Please Don’t Pick on the Pool Builder

It appears that in the County of Orange and other far-off regions, some people are jumping to ridiculous conclusions about the drought and shortage of water.

Many of us are also concerned; however, I don’t feel it is fair to pick on the pool builder and the consumer who wants to enjoy a swimming pool. Yes, on the surface it seems like a swimming pool uses a lot of water. Of course we certainly do not want to waste water, so be sure your pool doesn’t have a leak, a pretty obvious issue. Beyond a possible leak, when you think about the water consumption per square foot on a piece of property, you have many other culprits which are much bigger wasters of water. The biggest culprit is your luscious green Marathon II sod lawn. This lawn uses much more water per square foot on your property than any other item except for maybe your toilet and shower. I believe the lawn and landscaping needs more attention than the swimming pool.

We did some research and found out that the per square foot evaporation rate of a swimming pool at an average temperature of 75 degrees is almost half of what it takes to maintain a Marathon II sod lawn. But, this doesn’t take into account the area around a pool known as decking which is either a concrete or other hard surface which requires no water. If you take the square footage of your swimming pool and decking area into account, you will likely see about 50% or less consumption of water compared to a lawn with landscaping.

I believe we all need to tighten up our water saving belt. As a pool builder, have done this by planting drought tolerant landscaping around my backyard pool. I have also removed my front lawn and replaced it with hard stone and drought tolerant succulents to greatly reduce my water consumption.

This is Southern California and I love being able to splish-splash in my swimming pool. I don’t want to feel guilty about enjoying my swimming pool and I don’t want others to feel guilty either.